Why do so many want to disect his words?

This was not written to be torn all apart.

It was written to be read into 'your' heart.

Not viewed and discussed like he wrote it wrong.

To hear his words through your own understanding.

To know his love, his power, and hold it strong.

Ask twenty people to read just one verse.

Then ask them each to translate what they felt

it ment to them.

You will find many different thoughts and

versions, of what they felt he ment.

That is because thats what he wanted them to feel.

Not you, just them. Projections to them each.

Is that so hard to understand? Please, just reach!

Your eyes and minds were made by HE.

Read his words for all to see.

But know that all were written each for thee.

Seek not more than you can see.


Peace, Love, and Be YOU!

Hey. Wow. I loved reading that. Thanks for sharing.

That's very romantic Terry, but there are deeper truths to be considered.

You speak as though the current scriptures that we today call, the "New Testament", are 'His Words', but there are very compelling reasons to believe that this isn't true.

The Teaching Company has a great course on this called "The Lost Christianities".

Historians have discovered that the biblical writings that are popular today were not the only writings around. On the contrary they are highly suspicious. After the life of Jesus (assuming he lived at all) there were many rumors about his teachings. There were many different beliefs in Early Christianity. Many Christians were like Buddhists, they viewed Christ as a man just like Buddha. And although they followed him (just as a Buddhist follows the teaching of Buddha) they didn't not view him as divine. Many Christians did not even believe that Christ was crucified at all much less that he rose from the dead.

The Christian faith was indeed based entirely on rumors that had been passed around by word of mouth. There were few documents around and none of them written by the man called Jesus himself.

Historians now believe that the scriptures that we call the New Testament were actually written from a stance of authority in an attempt to give credence to specific rumors. None of the 'gospels' are eyewitness accounts. It is highly questioned that the authors of these scriptures were even the men that they claimed to be. It is believed by many scholars that these scriptures that we have today were actually written to support and validate merely one of many rumors about the man named Jesus.

So while your post is very romantic, in truth, no one knows whether the words in the New Testament truly had anything at all to do with the man named Jesus. To call them "His Words" is judicious. At the very best they are rumors that had been written down several decades after Jesus had died. It is virtually impossible to know whether the New Testament is even close to what Jesus actually taught, must less to believe that it is actually "His Words" verbatim.



Reach for what? Should we not be interested in truth? What if the New Testament that we currently have truly is a distortion of what Jesus was all about? What if Jesus was never born of a virgin? What if it was never his intent to die for the sins of man? What if he never did rise from the dead?

Wouldn't you want to know that the life of Jesus was used and abused by people who wanted you do believe these things?

What is so romantic about believing that God had to send his only begotten son to die for our terribly pathetic behavior?

I'm sorry if you find this disappointing Terry, but nothing would give me greater joy than to learn that the conclusions of the New Testament are indeed lies.

At the same time nothing would give me greater sadness than to believe that they are true.

There is no way that I could ever be proud, or happy, or romanticize the idea that we as humans have failed our creator to the point where he had to sacrifice a divine being to pay for our pathetic disgrace.

That, to me Terry, is an extremely ugly picture of creation and of a man/God relationship. There is nothing pretty or romantic about it at all. It is nothing short of an absolutely pathetic disgrace.

I would never believe it on faith alone. Give me any reasonable doubt at all, and I'll gladly dismiss it as the lies of men who were trying to control the masses using a guilt trip. Historians are finding evidence that this is more likely the actual case.

So you'll have to forgive me when I bulk at your conclusion that the New Testament is "His Word". We have no reason to believe that in reality. None at all. On the contrary we have more reason to believe that those scriptures are indeed a fabrication of lies by a group of 'Christians' who wanted to establish their rumors as the 'Gospel Truth'.

I pray to the powers that be that the New Testament is indeed a big fat lie. To believe that it is true would be the most horrid thing I can imagine. A nightmare of infinite proportions.

It's not something I would chose to believe on pure faith. I can assure you of this. It's not a pretty picture at all. And I'll never understand why so many people try to romanticize it. There is nothing romantic in the belief that we have miserably failed our creator. It's a truly ugly story. There's no two ways about it.

There are actually much prettier stories of Jesus in existence. They simply aren't as popularized as the biblical version. So when you speak of "His Words", you totally lose me, because we have absolutely no reason whatsoever to attribute the popular version of the New Testament to the actual 'words' of Jesus. The entire Bible is hearsay and there is very good reason to believe that it is merely one of many versions of rumors.

Shouldn't we be more interested in seeking truth?

There are very good and healthy reasons to question whether the Bible is truly the word of any supreme being. After all, the people who wrote it are claiming to speak for your heavenly father. What if they lied Terry? Wouldn't that truly boil your blood?

I personally see no reason to trust the men who wrote those scriptures. I don't view those scriptures as "His Word". It's as simple as that.

It most likely has nothing to do with "His Words" as far as I'm concerned. This is what history is revealing to us. We’ve been duped!

I just genuinely enjoy bothering people and in particular I am irritated by the OT's mischaracterization of rabbits. They dont "cheweth the cud." Thats a glaring error. Also, bats are not birds. If they can make mistakes like this, the whole illusion begins to unravel.

"Dont pay attention to the man behind the curtain." is resounding in my ears when I read this stuff.

You're forgetting the parable of the "prodigal son", though. Each person moves toward understanding in his or her own way and at his own pace.

If Nob hadn't wanted for humans to understand him, he would not have sent his avatar in human form to teach them. If he didn't have respect for human intelligence (which according to the story he created "in his own image") his avatar would not have been a well-educated and well-spoken man.

Human understanding involves questioning and investigation, and never arrives via blind acceptance.

If after a life of questioning sacred writings, a person finds a greater understanding of and love for divinity, is it "too late"..? If the answer is "no", then let the people argue. They'll either get it at some point or they won't.

I do consider it sort of annoying when people try to pick everything in a text apart and argue each little point--but it's just annoying like listening to a bunch of little kids screaming and yelling when one has a hangover is annoying. Kids are gonna be kids and it's wiser to let them go on with their childishness even when they're being annoying. I hope this was helpful. yours in Chaos, Scarlett

Too late for what? That's the whole point.

If the purpose is to be 'saved' from eternal damnation then I suppose it's never tool late for that. But doesn't it seem extremely strange that salvation would depend on nothing more than what a person believes?

What about all the good natured people who lived very positive and constructive lives? Will they be damned to hell just because they didn't believe in a particular religious fable? I don't think any human in their right mind would consider that to be 'righteous'.

Clearly if there is 'salvation' to be had in life it can't boil down to what a person believes. It could only be based on their works and actions. Anything less that that would be totally unrighteous.

So then the question of whether or not it is 'too late' comes down to whether or not a person learns the important lessons in life early enough to make a difference while they are still alive. In that case, there is no salvation to be considered, and beliefs are moot. The only important thing is whether or not they have learned good actions.

It is my firm opinion that a religion that preaches a need for personal salvation totally misses the point of teaching genuinely good actions. Instead all it does is serve to cause people to be judgmental of others based on their religious beliefs. That's hardly a positive thing.

I can only say that I would have been taught the TRUTH when I was a child. And the TRUTH is that no one knows which, if any, ancient belief systems hold any divine knowledge. On the contrary, open-minded sincere investigations suggests that no human knowledge has any basis in the divine.

That's the TRUTH. Why can't people just teach the TRUTH and then let everyone decide for themselves how they would like to think about any divinity, or not.

It's actually a lie to teach that the Bible is the word of God. No man has a clue whether there is any divine knowledge in the bible or not. No man. So why lie and claim that they do?

Lying is never good. Especially not when done in the name of a God who may not even approve of the lies being told!

I just wish that people hadn't lied to me in the name of God.

It was wrong of them to do that.

The very short and consise answer to your question Terry if very simple.

Everyone isn't convinced that the Bible represents "His words".

There are a myriad of reasons, both logical and historical, to believe that the Bible is not the words of Jesus.

There are a myriad of reasons why people in power would have motivations to write their own versions.

And, most importantly to me, there are a myriad of reasons why it makes no sense at all to believe that a truly divine all-wise creator would have every put together a book like the Bible.

If the Bible truly represents the mindset, personality, and intelligence of the creator of this universe then things are very sad indeed.

It would mean that our creator isn't all that different from us, including being egotistical and not very bright.

If you handed me this book and said, "This is a description of your father". I'd read it, then hand it back to you and say, "I don't think so".

It's that simple.

I don't believe that the creator of this universe is a crude and rude as the Bible claims.

When I question the Bible I'm not questioning the 'word of God'.

On the contrary, I'm asking the very valid question of whether the Bible has any divinity at all.

I've asked this question for many decades.

My conclusion is that the Bible appears to me to have been written by men who had religious agendas.

I don't see any divinity in the book overall Terry.

And that's my honest sincere conclusion.

So when you ask:



I have to ask you, "Who's words are your talking about?"

There's no reason why I should believe that the Bible contains the words of Jesus or any other supreme being for that matter.

I dissect them for the purpose of exposing the true motivations of the humans who actually wrote them!

It's just not a divine text IMHO.

Because when the discrepancies outway the truths, as you call them.... a discerning person will dissect them....

.........and find them lacking.

Divine wisdoms?

Some....

Mostly propaganda force fed to the masses to manipulate and manage them.

Any doctrine that will not bear investigation is not a fit tenant for the mind of an honest man.

-Robert Ingersoll

That a very wise quote.

And why would anyone want to believe in anything without questioning it?

Especially a story that claims that they are at odds with their creator.

Why would anyone want to believe that without seriously looking into it?

If other people want to believe that they are at odds with their creator, more power to them. But why should they expect me to believe it without questioning it?

And when I do question it, I quickly discover that it has no serious merit at all.

Maybe that's why they don't want me to question it?

The impression I have is that Christians are not comfortable with questions at all and especially not when it concerns the bible. They just want you to "stop being so nit picky" and "stop putting so much weight on small, insignificant details". Well its those small details that actually begin to unravel the larger scope and impression the religion is trying to impart. Its like pulling on a little loose thread on a sweater and the next thing you know, you have an unraveled big pile of yarn on the floor.

If you want to just believe in it and have faith, fine. More power to you. But get a thicker skin because people have the right to question the scripture. Im sure humans have been wanting answers to some of these problems and contradictions since the time of Jesus.

I actually don't disagree with you on this one Krimsa.

So many of you people here have spent your lives trying to other,,,BELIEVE in GOD, or DIS-BELIEVE that GOD IS REAL.
Readings you say,,,from early writes,,,ok,,,If none of us lived then at that time then NONE of us know ANYTHING as a fact.
Because words printed can all be lies..
EVERYONE seems to want to find out all that they seek...But no one will ever have the ANSWER to life.
Until in THIS time we have someone come back and tell us all about it,,,And I don't mean a short death experience,,,I mean DEAD and come back after about a year...lol

If you live to be in this life as a peaceful human being, and compassionate to others and respectful.....then your cool,,,and you could be a good friend to me..
But if you LIVE ONLY this life as a shell, and not care about another human being or shall I say all human beings..and have no desire to care,,,
then shame on you and your selfish heart and soul.
Nobody should live only to die,,
WE have a reasoning for LIVING THIS WORLD.
And its NOT just to want more LIVING after our deaths here in this life.
WE ALL NEED to worry MORE about caring about human life, NOW, than how well we THINK we will do in ANOTHER!
I feel everyone is so damm conserned with putting someone else down or dis-proving another's beliefs
that THEY have lost the whole consept of true compassion for a fellow human.
Its all about ME,,,,,and the hell with caring about anyone else..THIS IS how I think MOST of you feel inside...

What is a bird?

Birds are class avian. They are the most diverse tetrapod vertebrates on the face of the planet. They are also bipedal and endothermic (warm blooded) You would think god might be capable of imparting his divine wisdom to these idiots seeing as he made them? I know it and Im a little girl.